Who pays for the takeaway?

[boozysuzy16]

DH has a lot of friends that visit us. We live very near a motorway that leads to a holiday destination in the UK so in the summer we have a lot of people 'dropping in'. I am heavily pregnant and with a toddler, DH works full time so we haven't wanted to cook for these people so takeaways have been suggested. Except that now I've realised in August alone we spent £300 on takeaways for people visiting, DH always goes to get them with those staying and it seems pays for them. He says its our house so we should be paying. I think we should go splits as they are dropping in on us, asking to pop in and we haven't specifically invited them. We don't go to their houses as with young DC we are never in the area and they never invite us. AIBU?

Apologies if you've already mentioned it and I've missed it, but is your partner much of a cook? If he's so keen to keep these visits going, he can get his pinny on and start chopping onions!

This is one situation where I LOVE how blunt my Dad is..

If people want to stay whilst on the way from one end of the country to the other he makes it super clear 'thats fine but I don't have enough food to entertain so either bring a meal or take me out for dinner at the pub in exchange for your stay'..

He doesn't give a monkeys if people think he is tight (he IS tight) and on the whole, people do (usually take him to the pub and buy him dinner) - v occasionally someone doesnt and then they get GLARED at ALL NIGHT and he harrumphs about talking about being hungry and making a big show of how theres ONLY ONE PACK OF CRACKERS LEFT... etc

They don't do it a second time.

Buying food from Cook won't save money, it's more expensive than a takeaway (takeaways near us are cheap) - well it's about the same price per 'meal' but with takeaways you get a lot more food so could feed more for the same money, or have leftovers, which you wouldn't have with Cook.

If the guests are good friends; and on a budget and don't necessarily want to pay for takeaway; and have basically invited themselves over; then it is not entirely outlandish that they offer to cook. they could just make pasta or frittata or something simple for everyone - you have hosted in the sense that it is your house, but they have helped out. is that bonkers? I don't think so. If I didn't have money to treat my host I don't think I would invite myself, now, but I can imagine when I was younger and habitually poorer saying, "I know you're exhausted with the pregnancy and the toddler, and I would love to see you, but I don't want to put you out. Can I just come over with some food and make us dinner?"

See if they were friends I would pay, drop in or not. If we cook for visitors we always spend more than anyway. I don't know how many evenings £300 covers but it might not be that outrageous.

Oh, just seen that's in a month. Wow! That is a lot.

I'd buy easy food in and just heat it up.

It's never happening again. I'm starting to get the 'ooh when the baby is here we will come and see you' now. It's not happening.

I had a similar situation and finally put a stop to it. We live in a holiday destination and ever since we moved a friend of DH (who we hadn't seen for two years) started inviting not only himself but random friends over to our house . I could have dealt with it if it was a few hours by the pool and a few beers and snacks provided by us, but oh no, he had different expectations . He wanted to stay at least one night, have DH BBQ and provide booze , be noisy in our pool when DS was trying to sleep...The final straw was two weeks ago when DH had invited just this friend but he bought three other people and one of them brought her dog!! They brought an opened bottle of cheap vodka but chose to drink our nice wines and expensive rum.
I'm 11 weeks pregnant, all day sickness and grouchy, and told my husband NEVER again.
You need to put your foot down and tell your DH to go visit the lads instead, or if he insists on inviting them then tell Bob to bring the ribs , John to bring beer and so on. As for these freeloading holiday makers, I would simply say " Yes we'll be at home if you want to pop by. I have to warn you I'm pregnant and not up to shopping, let alone cooking. So you might want to eat before you get here . Coffee, toast, cornflakes for breakfast.

Well done Leopard!

I think the 'guest' or not thing is a red herring. It's to do with whether he wants real friends more or fake friends.

The majority of these 'friends' are freeloading fakes and even if he had a billion pounds in the bank I don't think he should be happy to play the mug for the fakes.